They are days removed from the immediate aftermath of the injury: half John's face painted in blood. Traces remain where Petrana's ministrations had fallen short, or where there had been no rectifying blood-sodden cloth.
John's hand lifts, fits to Flint's hip beneath the drape of his coat.
"I'm going to speak to Bastien," John says, diverted by the thought of aftermaths and their utility. "We might begin printing broadsides to spread word of the events."
This is a surface level consideration, the most immediate thing to hand. The loss of the Grand Enchanter is nothing less than a seismic shift. (Who else had she told, if anyone, about John Silver?)
"I didn't hear," he continues, thoughtfully. "Whether or not you were successful in procuring the feather bed."
Ha, ha.
(In half an hour, James Flint may once again observe Howell ministering to John Silver, albeit for a far less serious injury.)
They must have made for a unique escort when they'd managed to rendezvous with their Chantry Mother.
"Forgive me, I misplaced it during the retreat." It's a joke made rote, not particularly in the temper for them. Without knowing what other bruises might be lurking unseen beneath mud and blood spattered fabric, he doesn't relocate his hands so much as remove them to hovering near elbow and wrist.
"Gwenaëlle had thought to write to some lord in Markham."
A huff of laughter, whatever rejoinder John had to hand discarded on the consideration of letters.
"If she has a sense as to which one would be receptive, and inclined to share their thoughts among their peers in the salon, I see no reason not to pursue both routes."
And beyond that. There's the Orlesian court to consider, and the populace there. The remainder of the Inquisition, who might idolize the late Prince.
John breathes out. The muted calls between sailors on deck hardly breaks the quiet; it is as rote as the creak of wood and slap of ocean and gentle sway of the deck beneath their feet.
"We got our hands on some Venatori correspondence. It'll be something for you and Yseult to discuss tomorrow, I think," John relays, tacking this piece of information on alongside the rest. The papers are in the saddlebags, dropped by the door. They might stay there until dawn, as far as John is concerned.
In a half hour, when Howell has scrambled aboard and into this cabin and has set to dressing the gash on John's forehead, Flint will excavate those papers from the saddlebags and begin to review their contents.
(There is a patch in John's beard that has matted flat from dry blood. He should call for fresh water to brought forward now rather than wait for the surgeon to materialize.)
The fingers of John’s opposite hand drum a slapdash rhythm against the table, impeded only slightly by John’s thumb hooked over his crutch.
“There’s no need to abandon the thought.”
Only find another lord with which to enact it.
His palm shifts, up over the hard leather of Flint’s belt to resettle over his side, over thinner fabric. Feel the rise and fall of Flint’s breath in some tangible way, a stop gap measure in this space of time where they wait for Howell to come and go from the cabin.
He does touch him then—a small, careful thing. The fingertips hovering near John's elbow make contact less with his arm and more the road wearied fabric about it, coarse linen between rough fingers. And here is the narrowest point of true contact: the set of his thumb against a thin strip of exposed wrist. It does nothing to moderate the sober, blunted shape of his attention. But it does satisfy an inclination he's known not since that drizzling afternoon in Vallomire with Julius at his elbow, but days prior to it: that bleak grey pre-dawn morning in Stoneweale, blood painted up the length of his forearm safely concealed under the length of his shirt sleeve. The easy clasp of hands that had marked their parting.
"We'd the wall down and a majority of the refugees up through the river shallows before the Imperial forces mustered a reply. Cavalry. They were messy and we were lucky." Simple enough. "Rowntree and Rivain came close to being less so."
But if Flint has a scratch on him, then it must be under his clothes.
Slowly over the words, weighing possibility. The likelihood that Flint was in the thick of that mess, that he might be carrying some injury still.
The application of his thumb to the exposed strip of skin at John’s wrist breaks down some of John’s composure; draws a breath from him, a list forward by a few minor degrees. It is tempting to close the distance entirely.
(The door will open, by and by, to admit Howell and John has no interest in an audience to this small, precious intimacy.)
He is not referring to Starkhaven, to the mud and stone mixed killing fields outside its walls, or to the long march toward safety which had followed that final burst of chaotic violence. With Rowntree flat on his back and Petrana having narrowly scraped free of some equal or worse outcome—(there is the shard in her hand to consider)—, applying any serious question to Julius might have well reaped a perfectly satisfactory response. But with the matter of confidence in question, applying further pressure in a vulnerable moment had seemed
Appealing. And counter productive.
Irritating, now, to realize otherwise. Nevermind that the whole thing will require broader litigation. It might have been a start in the right direction.
"You should sit before that boot gives out," he says, and kisses him then—brief; more thoughtless and undecorated than the thumb at John's wrist; as if it's the first part of pulling away after to cede a path to the chair.
“It’s gotten me this far,” John counters, though he is contented by the kiss. It takes the sting out of the separation, the necessity of straightening again afterwards. Relocating, hooking the chair from its place along the wall to drag it further into the room.
Though he doesn’t sit, not yet. He braces a hand along the back of the chair, listens beyond the cabin for a long moment to the stirrings of movement, the groan of wood underfoot. The hum of his blood beating up to him from the stained boards and table in the belly of the ship.
There is a uniquely disorienting sense to occupying this space, still stained with his own blood and mottled with bruising. Worlds away from the stretch of time spent on the window ledge, sick and weak and cursing his own uselessness but near enough that John feels it clutching at his remaining ankle.
“Were you lucky all the mess of that retreat?”
Edited (finishing a thought oop. ) 2023-03-22 18:51 (UTC)
For his part, he makes no move to follow—lingering there in that passage between the slung bunk and table, an obstacle to and from the door.
"I was. Though I doubt we should credit Research's long gun."
The next time John Silver wants to mark him with his blood, he may protest. Not the blood, but the placement; it had been hot work and there must be better places to post the mark that would permit him the luxury of rolling back his sleeves.
“I’ll send Madame de Foncé a bottle to express my gratitude.”
As little expectation as he has regarding Flint’s ability to operate at a distance in any lasting way, the effectiveness of this option is worthy of some celebration.
After a beat of quiet, John slants a smile back to Flint as he begins the process of shucking off his coat.
“I know it’s likely they’ve already woken Howell, and hauled him onto the water, but I’m of a mind to leave that door bolted and try our luck on that bunk.”
—Prompts a skeptical look to the narrow space in question. To say nothing of the structural integrity of the planking itself nor the eyebolts from which it hangs.
"I'm not certain either of us should risk further blows to the head at this stage" he says, attention sliding back. "Once Howell's done his due diligence, you can sleep there. I'll see a hammock brought up."
Comfortably? No. But in the wake of Nascere, comfort had not ranked very highly in their considerations. It ranks low among John’s priorities now.
The coat is peeled off, slowly, carefully. Not shaken out, in consideration of the closed space, but folded twice over before John turns to lay it over the table. So arranged, the blood soaked into the collar is adequately masked.
“I missed you,” is just a little funny, said this way. On the heels of discussing near kidnappings and injury and the management of a drive break and surrendering of an entire city.
But it is true. True enough that it outweighs the prospect of separate arrangements.
The shadows cast by the slow flex of the lamplight would press and ease on their own accord even without any additional assistance from the flickering pull of feeling that rises briefly there into Flint's face. A flat tug at the corner of his mouth; something like a momentary relief of the low set of his brow, the frown which has been set there made more stark by this temporary concession. His hand twitches out absently toward the bunk, as if motivated to brush against the chain at its fore corner but failing to get that far before the impulse passes.
It has been simple to wear some measure of confidence in front of Julius, and he'd not questioned the reassurance that had come to him by proxy—that whatever injury John had suffered in the field was minor enough not to merit rescue or excessive hand wringing. They have all had their share of bumps and bruises and cuts, and it would be lunatic to lose sleep over every scratch.
Nonetheless, after receiving word by Petrana's borrowed crystal, Flint had set down his work to go loiter at the quarterdeck's rail where he might give some rigorous study to the various boat lamps crawling across the harbor out of Kirkwall. There, he'd waited impatiently for one to prove itself to be traveling in a satisfying direction. It seems the gross luxury of being landlocked has reduced him to be somewhat intolerant of separations. So much for whatever resistance he'd built up over thirty years at sea.
"I'll see a hammock brought up," he repeats. "To satisfy Howell. But we'll see what can be made of what's here."
A smile pulls crooked across John's face, satisfied with the concession.
It is not longer after that Howell himself arrives, rumpled and quietly impatient with the turn his evening has taken. John is bidden upon his arrival to occupy the chair, where Howell can give due attention to the gash curved from forehead down to John's temple, the place it has split over one eyebrow. The salve applied stings viciously enough to make John's eyes water; elfroot or not, the burn of it lingers as the skin begins to knit.
As promised, the letters are dredged from John's pocket and given over to Flint's examination. The narrow scribble discusses the transport of a group to Photious, a wider scrawl assuring the handling of the last leg of transfer to the Island. Others discuss Starkhaven in now useless detail, fit to be discarded had it occurred to either John or Petrana in the moment.
The tailend of Howell's ministrations, fingers over the livid bruising at John's ribs after the unlacing of his tunic, is marked by some flurry of activity. The arrival of hammock, a rough-hewn pail and chipped basin, all set into place for the price of a truncated account of current happenings drawn from John as Howell dances around the movement of his hands.
By and by, the room empties. On deck, the stomping of feet is heard briefly. John leans back in his chair, eyeing the drape of the hammock.
"Remind me in the morning, we might see that Howell has some proper elfroot salve instead of whatever it is he's made himself."
Flint, for his part in all this, had removed himself to the bank of stern windows where he might stand with his back braced against the casement dividers and review the papers under the light of the supplemental lantern hooked in the corner—well out of the way of Howell's handiwork, and content to weather the flurry of activity and chatter with his shoulders pressed flush to the idle sway of the ship as she rises and falls gently against her anchor chains. There is a certain kind of satisfaction in minding his own business at the margin while Messere Silver holds court with the men eager to see him made something like comfortable and secure—part a secret pleasure for the rythmn John finds, and part well earned relief. He has been talking to these fucks for the last however many days, and thank Andraste that there's someone else to do it now.
When the men have retreated—the last hangers-on driven guiltily back to their posts or lack thereof with a sharp look and a blunt, 'It's not the fucking dog watch, is it?'—, Flint folds up the papers and moves to store them in his desk drawer.
"Worried a scar won't suit you?"
The drawer rasps closed. The light in that little ancillary lantern is snuffed out.
"Without my good looks, I've precious little to trade on."
Ha, ha.
Occupying the chair, laces undone and tunic untucked, and more or less released to his own devices, John stretches his leg out in front of him. Observes the disappearance of the letters, the extinguishing of the lamp, with his hands folded loosely over his belly. Without an outside audience, exhaustion comes seeping slowly in at the edges of his expression and the set of his shoulders, marked in the loosening of his body and the minor tells of discomfort revealed in the wake of it.
"I thought you might carry those to Yseult. We've a starting point, and between the two of you there may be a way to gather the pieces left out of our acquisition."
"Possibly." Photious is quite clear so far as direction goes. "Was there any indication from your captives that might clarify who or what this group could consist of?"
Upon first reading those lines, his mind had turned immediately to the trade of enslaving prisoners. With Tevinter's forces having eaten up the Minanter west of Starkhaven, it is easy to imagine them floating captured Free Marchers in the opposite direction—running them out to the sea, hooked past the Rivaini horn and dashing north as quick as the wind would take them. Not the shortest route, but safest for the season and the preservation of aforementioned valuable cargo. Driving a march through the Hundred Pillars in late winter sounds like an excellent way to lose a great deal of stock.
"Regrettably, we didn't stay long enough to overhear much of their conversation."
Which John amends to—
"We might ask Petrana if she overheard anything before she and I took our leave."
It's John's assumption that she would have said, had there been any useful discussion in the space between their capture and John returning to consciousness. But he has to acknowledge the possibility, the gap which he cannot account for.
"Do you imagine they're attempting to replicate what they were seeking to do in Nascere?"
No, says the brief way Flint stills—struck sharp by the stab of it. He hadn't been imagining that.
"I've no idea what they're trying," he says, slowly reeling himself back to the track the question had struck him from. "But it should be no great thing to find out."
Is maybe slightly generous. Considerably less so:
"You're certain? In your assessment of de Cedoux."
Stood there behind the desk's corner, his hand shifts absently at the heavy furniture's decorative carved edge. Considering, visibly, how satisfied he is with the shape of that. That it is the preferable option between those two points is given. Yet there is something sharp between the ribs that this does nothing to dislodge. It's not so fine a point to puncture, to slip past bone into the soft necessary things; but he feels it there, the equivalent of a jagged stone lodged against him. He struggles to name it as much as he does to squirm away from its edge. Eventually, the bruise will either become so tender as to make itself known or the discomfort will grow ordinary.
For lack of a more clear thing to study, he devotes his attention to the man he shares the room with.
But lacking a clear sense of how it might be changed beyond what had already been brokered between the two of them. Petrana had been transparent in her reasoning. John had not found that duplicitous, only—
There is something that rankles.
"But knowing her reasons, and perhaps having made clear my own objections, we might avoid seeing the thing repeated."
Whatever comes next, because inevitably there will be something that comes next.
John's fingers unlace, hand falling to one thigh. Does not think of the road, or what might have come in that blank stretch of time between slipping from the saddle and waking with Petrana's voice in his ear. They are far removed. The bruises will heal. Should they ride out a second time, they will choose a better route to their destination.
There is some piece of the desk's edge that he can lodge his thumb against and press until the shape of it seems likely to leave a red mark on the hard pad of his calloused thumb.
"It will prove out one way or the other whether it is or not," Flint says at last, hand slipping from the edge of the desk.
Photious is just a place on a piece of paper which might be followed. And if they were to come to some accord as to the purpose of a tool and then put said instrument into the hand of Riftwatch's minor cadre of rebel mages, whether they would choose to use it according to that agreement or in service of something more directly beneficial to themselves is impossible to know until it happens. In either case, they are reduced to feeling after shapes in the dark and hoping those things will resolve themselves into some legible form before any teeth come to bear.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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John's hand lifts, fits to Flint's hip beneath the drape of his coat.
"I'm going to speak to Bastien," John says, diverted by the thought of aftermaths and their utility. "We might begin printing broadsides to spread word of the events."
This is a surface level consideration, the most immediate thing to hand. The loss of the Grand Enchanter is nothing less than a seismic shift. (Who else had she told, if anyone, about John Silver?)
"I didn't hear," he continues, thoughtfully. "Whether or not you were successful in procuring the feather bed."
Ha, ha.
(In half an hour, James Flint may once again observe Howell ministering to John Silver, albeit for a far less serious injury.)
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"Forgive me, I misplaced it during the retreat." It's a joke made rote, not particularly in the temper for them. Without knowing what other bruises might be lurking unseen beneath mud and blood spattered fabric, he doesn't relocate his hands so much as remove them to hovering near elbow and wrist.
"Gwenaëlle had thought to write to some lord in Markham."
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"If she has a sense as to which one would be receptive, and inclined to share their thoughts among their peers in the salon, I see no reason not to pursue both routes."
And beyond that. There's the Orlesian court to consider, and the populace there. The remainder of the Inquisition, who might idolize the late Prince.
John breathes out. The muted calls between sailors on deck hardly breaks the quiet; it is as rote as the creak of wood and slap of ocean and gentle sway of the deck beneath their feet.
"We got our hands on some Venatori correspondence. It'll be something for you and Yseult to discuss tomorrow, I think," John relays, tacking this piece of information on alongside the rest. The papers are in the saddlebags, dropped by the door. They might stay there until dawn, as far as John is concerned.
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(There is a patch in John's beard that has matted flat from dry blood. He should call for fresh water to brought forward now rather than wait for the surgeon to materialize.)
"I said 'had.'"
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“I see.”
The fingers of John’s opposite hand drum a slapdash rhythm against the table, impeded only slightly by John’s thumb hooked over his crutch.
“There’s no need to abandon the thought.”
Only find another lord with which to enact it.
His palm shifts, up over the hard leather of Flint’s belt to resettle over his side, over thinner fabric. Feel the rise and fall of Flint’s breath in some tangible way, a stop gap measure in this space of time where they wait for Howell to come and go from the cabin.
“How was it?”
The retreat. All that he was absent through.
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"We'd the wall down and a majority of the refugees up through the river shallows before the Imperial forces mustered a reply. Cavalry. They were messy and we were lucky." Simple enough. "Rowntree and Rivain came close to being less so."
But if Flint has a scratch on him, then it must be under his clothes.
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Slowly over the words, weighing possibility. The likelihood that Flint was in the thick of that mess, that he might be carrying some injury still.
The application of his thumb to the exposed strip of skin at John’s wrist breaks down some of John’s composure; draws a breath from him, a list forward by a few minor degrees. It is tempting to close the distance entirely.
(The door will open, by and by, to admit Howell and John has no interest in an audience to this small, precious intimacy.)
“Would you call it a success, on your end?”
As John had been successful on his own mission.
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He is not referring to Starkhaven, to the mud and stone mixed killing fields outside its walls, or to the long march toward safety which had followed that final burst of chaotic violence. With Rowntree flat on his back and Petrana having narrowly scraped free of some equal or worse outcome—(there is the shard in her hand to consider)—, applying any serious question to Julius might have well reaped a perfectly satisfactory response. But with the matter of confidence in question, applying further pressure in a vulnerable moment had seemed
Appealing. And counter productive.
Irritating, now, to realize otherwise. Nevermind that the whole thing will require broader litigation. It might have been a start in the right direction.
"You should sit before that boot gives out," he says, and kisses him then—brief; more thoughtless and undecorated than the thumb at John's wrist; as if it's the first part of pulling away after to cede a path to the chair.
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Though he doesn’t sit, not yet. He braces a hand along the back of the chair, listens beyond the cabin for a long moment to the stirrings of movement, the groan of wood underfoot. The hum of his blood beating up to him from the stained boards and table in the belly of the ship.
There is a uniquely disorienting sense to occupying this space, still stained with his own blood and mottled with bruising. Worlds away from the stretch of time spent on the window ledge, sick and weak and cursing his own uselessness but near enough that John feels it clutching at his remaining ankle.
“Were you lucky all the mess of that retreat?”
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"I was. Though I doubt we should credit Research's long gun."
The next time John Silver wants to mark him with his blood, he may protest. Not the blood, but the placement; it had been hot work and there must be better places to post the mark that would permit him the luxury of rolling back his sleeves.
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As little expectation as he has regarding Flint’s ability to operate at a distance in any lasting way, the effectiveness of this option is worthy of some celebration.
After a beat of quiet, John slants a smile back to Flint as he begins the process of shucking off his coat.
“I know it’s likely they’ve already woken Howell, and hauled him onto the water, but I’m of a mind to leave that door bolted and try our luck on that bunk.”
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"I'm not certain either of us should risk further blows to the head at this stage" he says, attention sliding back. "Once Howell's done his due diligence, you can sleep there. I'll see a hammock brought up."
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Comfortably? No. But in the wake of Nascere, comfort had not ranked very highly in their considerations. It ranks low among John’s priorities now.
The coat is peeled off, slowly, carefully. Not shaken out, in consideration of the closed space, but folded twice over before John turns to lay it over the table. So arranged, the blood soaked into the collar is adequately masked.
“I missed you,” is just a little funny, said this way. On the heels of discussing near kidnappings and injury and the management of a drive break and surrendering of an entire city.
But it is true. True enough that it outweighs the prospect of separate arrangements.
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It has been simple to wear some measure of confidence in front of Julius, and he'd not questioned the reassurance that had come to him by proxy—that whatever injury John had suffered in the field was minor enough not to merit rescue or excessive hand wringing. They have all had their share of bumps and bruises and cuts, and it would be lunatic to lose sleep over every scratch.
Nonetheless, after receiving word by Petrana's borrowed crystal, Flint had set down his work to go loiter at the quarterdeck's rail where he might give some rigorous study to the various boat lamps crawling across the harbor out of Kirkwall. There, he'd waited impatiently for one to prove itself to be traveling in a satisfying direction. It seems the gross luxury of being landlocked has reduced him to be somewhat intolerant of separations. So much for whatever resistance he'd built up over thirty years at sea.
"I'll see a hammock brought up," he repeats. "To satisfy Howell. But we'll see what can be made of what's here."
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It is not longer after that Howell himself arrives, rumpled and quietly impatient with the turn his evening has taken. John is bidden upon his arrival to occupy the chair, where Howell can give due attention to the gash curved from forehead down to John's temple, the place it has split over one eyebrow. The salve applied stings viciously enough to make John's eyes water; elfroot or not, the burn of it lingers as the skin begins to knit.
As promised, the letters are dredged from John's pocket and given over to Flint's examination. The narrow scribble discusses the transport of a group to Photious, a wider scrawl assuring the handling of the last leg of transfer to the Island. Others discuss Starkhaven in now useless detail, fit to be discarded had it occurred to either John or Petrana in the moment.
The tailend of Howell's ministrations, fingers over the livid bruising at John's ribs after the unlacing of his tunic, is marked by some flurry of activity. The arrival of hammock, a rough-hewn pail and chipped basin, all set into place for the price of a truncated account of current happenings drawn from John as Howell dances around the movement of his hands.
By and by, the room empties. On deck, the stomping of feet is heard briefly. John leans back in his chair, eyeing the drape of the hammock.
"Remind me in the morning, we might see that Howell has some proper elfroot salve instead of whatever it is he's made himself."
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When the men have retreated—the last hangers-on driven guiltily back to their posts or lack thereof with a sharp look and a blunt, 'It's not the fucking dog watch, is it?'—, Flint folds up the papers and moves to store them in his desk drawer.
"Worried a scar won't suit you?"
The drawer rasps closed. The light in that little ancillary lantern is snuffed out.
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Ha, ha.
Occupying the chair, laces undone and tunic untucked, and more or less released to his own devices, John stretches his leg out in front of him. Observes the disappearance of the letters, the extinguishing of the lamp, with his hands folded loosely over his belly. Without an outside audience, exhaustion comes seeping slowly in at the edges of his expression and the set of his shoulders, marked in the loosening of his body and the minor tells of discomfort revealed in the wake of it.
"I thought you might carry those to Yseult. We've a starting point, and between the two of you there may be a way to gather the pieces left out of our acquisition."
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Upon first reading those lines, his mind had turned immediately to the trade of enslaving prisoners. With Tevinter's forces having eaten up the Minanter west of Starkhaven, it is easy to imagine them floating captured Free Marchers in the opposite direction—running them out to the sea, hooked past the Rivaini horn and dashing north as quick as the wind would take them. Not the shortest route, but safest for the season and the preservation of aforementioned valuable cargo. Driving a march through the Hundred Pillars in late winter sounds like an excellent way to lose a great deal of stock.
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Which John amends to—
"We might ask Petrana if she overheard anything before she and I took our leave."
It's John's assumption that she would have said, had there been any useful discussion in the space between their capture and John returning to consciousness. But he has to acknowledge the possibility, the gap which he cannot account for.
"Do you imagine they're attempting to replicate what they were seeking to do in Nascere?"
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"I've no idea what they're trying," he says, slowly reeling himself back to the track the question had struck him from. "But it should be no great thing to find out."
Is maybe slightly generous. Considerably less so:
"You're certain? In your assessment of de Cedoux."
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"I am."
Is this an easier topic than the thought that there is a second blood sacrifice being prepared somewhere in the north?
"She assumed our support, and acted as if it would be certain upon her return. To my mind, that's better than her assuming our opposition."
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For lack of a more clear thing to study, he devotes his attention to the man he shares the room with.
"And that satisfies you?"
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But lacking a clear sense of how it might be changed beyond what had already been brokered between the two of them. Petrana had been transparent in her reasoning. John had not found that duplicitous, only—
There is something that rankles.
"But knowing her reasons, and perhaps having made clear my own objections, we might avoid seeing the thing repeated."
Whatever comes next, because inevitably there will be something that comes next.
John's fingers unlace, hand falling to one thigh. Does not think of the road, or what might have come in that blank stretch of time between slipping from the saddle and waking with Petrana's voice in his ear. They are far removed. The bruises will heal. Should they ride out a second time, they will choose a better route to their destination.
"Is that enough for you?"
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"It will prove out one way or the other whether it is or not," Flint says at last, hand slipping from the edge of the desk.
Photious is just a place on a piece of paper which might be followed. And if they were to come to some accord as to the purpose of a tool and then put said instrument into the hand of Riftwatch's minor cadre of rebel mages, whether they would choose to use it according to that agreement or in service of something more directly beneficial to themselves is impossible to know until it happens. In either case, they are reduced to feeling after shapes in the dark and hoping those things will resolve themselves into some legible form before any teeth come to bear.
"You look tired," he tells him.
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It is a loose end that must be chased. Must be clarified, before they find themselves on the back foot with a second island splintering into the sea.
John exhales slowly, shakes his head.
“I might be.”
It had been a long journey. His body aches in ten different places.
“Come here,” he says anyway, eyes on Flint where he stands alongside that desk, far out of reach.
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